


satisfaction brought him back

by were_duck



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy
Genre: Emotional Constipation, F/M, Multi, Pete's kids (briefly), Witchcraft, alcohol use, dumb curses, exes reconnecting, implied possible Alicia/Pete/Meagan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-23
Updated: 2018-10-23
Packaged: 2019-08-06 11:17:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16386833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/were_duck/pseuds/were_duck
Summary: Curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought him back.





	satisfaction brought him back

**Author's Note:**

> for no_tags Oct 2018, written for the prompt Alicia Simmons/Pete Wentz, familiar . I had fun with this prompt, especially once I backread Alicia's Instagram.
> 
> Thanks so much to falter and marina for heroic last minute betaing! No points to falter for not telling me that this was their prompt.

"Wait, what?"

Pete's voice sounds ridiculous through her phone's shitty speakers. Alicia can't remember the last time she actually used the thing for a phone call. Fuck, this is messy.

"E minor, dude, keep up," Alicia says. 

"It's… gone?"

"Well. In Austin, anyway. You remember it, so it must be a localized thing." Alicia takes a slug of Jack and glares murderously out the sliding glass door at the setting sun. The air feels… heavy. Like the gathering before a snowstorm, but the skies are clear and warm. Not good. "I was really enjoying my retirement," Alicia whines.

"Hang on," Pete says, and she hears the awkward clatter of him setting his phone down without muting it. He has turned into _such_ a dad, she thinks. She puts him on speaker, gets through another finger of whisky and runs through several more chords before he comes back. Her fingers stutter way more than the alcohol can account for. 

"It's gone here, too," he reports. "F sharp diminished, too."

Alicia tries it, feeling the ghost of a chord her muscle memory knows but can't quite find. Fuck. 

"Fuck," she says. 

"MTE," Pete says, just to piss her off probably. Alicia breathes deeply and stares out the window before she opens her mouth again and fucks this up.

"Pete, c'mon. You can bring the whole crew if you have to. Just..." She trails off, and every syllable that's lined up in her head waiting to come next just… fizzes and vibrates under her tongue. She waits. He's quiet on the other end for a long minute before he sets the phone down again. She can hear him talking urgently with Meagan, and some kids are banging around in the background, but the sound is too distorted to make out what they're saying. 

Alicia tries to breathe some more without hyperventilating, and runs through some more chords. She gets them all, but G major is feeling kind of hinky, which is just fucked up in her opinion. What kind of bullshit curse would target the time-honored entry-level chord? She resolves to get the monster that built it just as soon as she convinces Pete to do what needs doing.

"We've got a flight booked tomorrow," Meagan says. Fuck's sake, her voice has no right to sound that good over this speakerphone. "Arriving at 6pm. Kids, too, so I hope you have air mattresses and ear plugs. Text Pete the address." She hangs up before Alicia can get a word in.

She stares at her phone for a second, as if the inert hunk of glass and plastic can help her figure out how to prep for the invasion of her rockstar ex and his stupidly gorgeous family. 

"Guess I better warn Danny," she sighs.

******

Danny, as always, has way more chill than Alicia. He and Pete exchange the kind of bro-y handshake that Pete would have totally mocked back when he and Alicia were dating. She can't help but smile at the two of them, the scruffy beardy warmth and penetrating gaze of men who've settled into an early middle age built on a foundation of creative energy and the abiding satisfaction they never even knew how to look for.

Alicia is really not sure how to handle this. 

"It's good to finally meet you in person," Meagan murmurs, pulling Alicia into an awkward hug. 

"Whatever he told you, it's probably bullshit," Alicia tells Meagan's thick braid, which smells faintly of sandalwood and heavily of airport. 

"That remains to be seen," she laughs, pulling away to give Alicia a full-on look. Alicia's surprised to notice Meagan's gaze darting a bit. She's nervous, at least a little bit, under that deceptively assured smile. 

"Let's get you all settled in. Pete, Meagan, you get the master bedroom. I borrowed a pop-up crib thing from one of my buddies. As for you guys," Danny says, planting his fists on his hips and frowning down at the two older kids. "C'mon. I hope you like murder basements. You too, peanut, if mom's okay with that?" He takes MJ carefully from her mother, doing a very able shush when she squawks in protest before settling in. 

Alicia rolls her eyes at him, and he shoots her a grin before leading the noisy kids off to show them the studio. 

He leaves a lot of silence behind him.

Alicia chews her lip, mentally running through the list of silences she's accumulated since she noticed the sudden lack of chord. It's gone past music, now. The rattle of fall leaves in the trees has grown patchy, the refrigerator's annoying hum has stopped completely, and she had woken with a start last night in terror when Danny's 'sleep breathing' went. She shook him awake violently, then banished herself to the couch before she would have to face a sleep-muddled, confused, weird-in-normal-ways boyfriend's addled attempts at comfort. 

Somehow, of all those quiets, this one is very much the worst. The whole air around her feels threaded with the kind of tension that is particular to facing someone you once gave a shit about and now barely know. And his beautiful partner, too. Alicia avoids them by staring resolutely out the sliding door at Kevin's empty dish. Shit, she needs to pick up cat food.

Predictably, Pete is the one who breaks the silence. It's why she made him come all this way, really.

"There was so much gone at the airport," he says, and his face is full of equal parts pissed off and grave. He's got the baby snuggled up on his shoulder and that is just. That's a lot to take in. Alicia focuses on the Kevin dish again and concentrates on listening to what Pete is saying. Everything feels like it's humming, which… it's been a long time. "The burn of the engines, the grind of the wheels folding up on takeoff… the way the toilet paper roll sounds… fuck, the CNN talking heads on the screen by our gate were dropping half their sentences and nobody even noticed."

 

Alicia steals a glance at Meagan, who seems to be taking this all in stride, content to keep taking Alicia's measure with that intense gaze. Pete could be reciting "Jabberwocky" for all it's fazeing Meagan. 

"He told you." Alicia has felt like her vowels have been in purgatory all morning, but this comment falls out of her mouth so fast she didn't even know it was coming. 

"Long time ago, yeah," Meagan says, softly. "Before Saint. He wanted me to know, in case… in case shit got weird."

Alicia shoots Pete a look, and he has the grace to look a little abashed, if not at all repentant.

"Come on. Danny will keep the kids occupied, and he's been looking forward to sacking out on a couch with a baby. Lemme show you the grotto. Both of you." She falls back on being a gruff motherfucker, which she sort of hates about herself, but fuck it. She's trying, and he's here, and this had better fucking work. 

Meagan's shoes are totally impractical for off-roading in the woods, but she keeps up just fine. Alicia can't tell if she resents or respects that, and ruefully acknowledges to herself that, yeah, that about sums her feelings about Meagan up all around. 

Pete is uncharacteristically quiet, hanging back behind the women as they pick their way along the trail Alicia knows like the back of her hand. She's not sure if it's the curse or just the awkwardness of this situation that's dampening his usual Pete-ness, but the absence of their old connection is tingling in Alicia's aura like a phantom limb that's fallen asleep. They don't belong here, either of them, and that thought makes her feel both superior and sad. 

The water in the grotto echoes with reassuring volume as Alicia steps across the edge to the altar. The space feels contained, whole, holy in a way that she'd been afraid it wouldn't feel. She breathes heavily, relishing the sandy humid tang in her lungs.

"It's beautiful, Leesh," Pete murmurs, and he's so close to her. He doesn't touch, but that singular something is vibrating between them. The power there is heady, and she has to steel herself to keep from just reaching for it. It's been a really long time. 

She meets Meagan's gaze. Meagan's brow is a little furrowed, like she knows she's missing something here, but she's calm. Alicia can feel a tiny potency in her, too, a potential that could, with care, germinate into a little more. 

"Meagan," Alicia says, beckoning her to step in closer. "This is gonna make no sense, but just… trust me. Him. Us. Yourself mostly. It'll feel weird but you'll know more than ever what to do, whatever it is you need to do. So just do it. I'm sorry. I hope this doesn't fuck anything up for you guys, but…" She shrugs.

Meagan looks, if anything, a little more confused, but she smiles a little bit at Alicia.

"Pete," Alicia says, and she touches him for the first time in years. Her hands cup his jaw, scratchy and heavy, and she doesn't have even a little trouble meeting his eyes. There's something marvelous about that. The phantom limb between them twitches, and the uncomfortable pins-and-needles of the atrophied connection hits. 

"You sure about this, kitten?" she murmurs, and he is still enough of a dickhead to pull an obnoxious face. 

"I _definitely_ dragged my whole family out here and canceled on a gallery opening to come here and say eh, nah. Come the fuck on."

"Yeah, yeah. Fuck you very much. Let's get this the fuck over with and have a drink, y?" Alicia smirks at him for a moment, reluctant to move into the next moment, but the sudden realization that her spoken vowels dropped out just then mean it's really fucking time to begin.

Her altar is simple, really. Some smooth creek stones, arranged in a haphazard oval. A feather. A coiled vine. Antlers. A piece of sheared shale. She's always been a magpie witch, more concerned with the spark of discovery than the pomp and ceremony favored by others. And so, settling into the core of herself, she reaches for the shale, cuts the thinnest part of the vine off the rest, and twists it around Pete's neck.

Pete falls to his knees before her, as he has always been meant to do, it seems, and she cups her hand at the base of his neck. The energy between them builds in fits and starts, and she feels him with the kind of pain she'd always welcomed in any moment that showed her she is alive. 

Pete is nuzzling her, now, purring, and she has to drag herself away from indulging in her enjoyment of that and focus. She reaches through them both, pressing against the ways that are wrong, hunting. She comes to a tangled knot, clearly part of the curse, and starts unpicking it, mental fingers working furiously as she re-envisions it from tangle to stretched over the body and neck of her trusty old bass. The malevolent matter vibrates under her hands, unwilling and contrary as she leans herself into the thing she can't help but know, fingers flying into chord progressions. A shivery deep hum rises and falls, threading out in a feeble attempt to escape before her fingers bring it confidently back. 

Meagan suddenly starts laughing. Alicia has to fight the urge to break the connection and check on her. The sounds pouring out of her are clearly not her usual vocal range, dropping into bass guffaws and screaming into high cackles. Alicia takes a moment to draw herself back into the familiarity of Pete, his power that feels like standing in front of a tower amp during the power solo, and reach through his steady love to Meagan. 

 

Her laughter is a manic burst, and for all its wrongness there's a glory in it. Alicia pushes towards it, encouraging the true chaotic glee and excitement she feels in there. 

"We've got you," Alicia says through Pete's mouth, and Meagan's laughter falls into a single voice, her own. Alicia can't spare the attention right now to make her eyes see anything, but she can feel the grin on Meagan's face in the muscles of her own. 

Pete's power is prowling around and through her, chasing the broken facets of the curse like voles into their burrows. To Alicia's surprise, they all squirm their way back to her, dissolving until they taste no different than the rest of the magic. 

A silent moment, then, this time one of witness. She reduces herself just enough back into herself that she can see the way Pete is looking up at her, his silver-peppered hair too short to flop into his eyes endearingly as it used to. It looks good, and she resists the urge to bury her fingers in his hair and pull his face into her. 

Meagan's hand on the small of her back isn't at all a shock, but the way she gently presses Pete's cheek until he is shamelessly rubbing his face on Alicia's thigh… well, that is a bit more of a surprise. 

The air between them clears, falls back to the normal way of air and light and sound. The grotto is just a grotto again, for now. 

Alicia hesitates, an uncharacteristic thing in the flush of her power, but.. They always ended their rituals with a kiss, back then, often a good hard fuck. Boyfriends come and go, sex is great and all, but the bond of a familiar, and the power in the rituals they build together, no matter how cliche or simple… that's...

Fuck, Alicia is so turned on.

Pete's eyes are kind, even though he's smirking a little bit, too. He stands, favoring his left hip a bit on the way up, and Alicia doesn't know what to do with any of this, her tongue or her face or her next move, nothing. Pete seems to guess that she's stuck in a loop, because he takes her hand with an overstated flourish, bends over it, and presses a gentle kiss to the backs of her fingers. She can still sense, in the fluttering remnants of their fading bond, how much he is holding back from taking her--any part of her she could want--into his mouth.

"That… was really hot," Meagan says, really close to Alicia's ear. 

"It always is," Alicia replies honestly, and then, "sorry."

Meagan just shrugs.

"It was yours," Pete mutters softly as Alicia takes the improvised collar off him and sets it back on her altar. "Your curse, I mean. Your magic."

"I didn't know," Alicia says. "I've been so happy here, so content 99 percent of the time with Danny, but sometimes… you get in your head and you just. You miss it, right?" she says fervently, pleading with Pete to understand.

"Yeah."

Meagan waves her elegant arms in the air, fed up. "You two are such idiots. Come on. We're going to rescue Danny, put the kids to bed, and _then_? We are going to _talk_ about this, like fucking normal, _non-magical_ , adults. I'm not sure what I'm going to be okay with or not, but what I just saw was… we gotta figure it out. No. More. Sound. Stealing. Wistful. Curses. Capische? Now come on, my feet are fucking killing me here." 

 

And so they do.


End file.
